Social innovation seeks to create transformational change in under-served, underrepresented, and disadvantaged communities worldwide. At IDEO, we use design thinking to address issues such as poverty, nutrition, health, water and sanitation, economic empowerment, access to financial services, and gender equity.

Our projects involve clients in both the private and public sectors. To help them develop effective solutions, we create not only products and services, but also the entire system that supports them. This often means spending considerable time in the field, living and working with the people we’re striving to assist. We routinely partner with local leaders (who act as our trusted advisers) to ensure that all concepts and solutions are practical, culturally appropriate, scalable, and sustainable.

This means that before introducing anything new, we figure out what really matters to the target population—and what will motivate them to accept and adopt our solution. We also consider funding and business models, materials and manufacturing, sales and marketing, distribution, and repair and service strategies. We pilot test and alter our designs accordingly to ensure that they have positive impact.

Creating New Offerings
From services for agricultural cooperatives to strategies for low-cost health care
We work with organizations to identify new ways to serve and support people. By uncovering people’s true needs and behaviors, we turn insights into actionable opportunities for design. Our methods include observation, prototyping, building, and storytelling—all of which can be applied to a breadth of organizational challenges in order to design new strategies, programs, services, products and communications.

Becoming More Human-Centered
From deep-dive workshops to organizational transformation
We enable organizations to change their cultures and build the capabilities required to sustain innovation. By focusing on a human centered design process, organizations are better able to interpret people’s needs in new ways allowing for the development of innovative, financially sustainable solutions.

Spreading and Building Success
From seeding innovation in microfinance institutions to implementing behavior change solutions
Rarely is there a single answer to a complex problem. Instead, we believe in an approach that helps spread a system of solutions. Our understanding of success at both a macro and micro level allows us to help organizations scale innovation. By identifying the essence of why a solution works and adapting it to meet the specific needs of local contexts, our approach ensures successful implementation, as well as long term adoption and behavior change.